


Nonary Game, The 1st: Playing With Fire

by Arq (NintendoFan)



Category: Zero Escape (Video Games)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:53:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26115247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NintendoFan/pseuds/Arq
Summary: A mysterious criminal calling themselves "Zero" welcomes you and eight other people, to their world, forcing you and your new companions to play a game: The Nonary Game.





	Nonary Game, The 1st: Playing With Fire

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work of fiction. Any person, place, or thing that may resemble that of the real world is purely coincidental.
> 
> 999 is not owned by me, this is fan fiction! Credits to Kotaro Uchikoshi for creating such a wonderful concept.
> 
> This story includes interactive fiction, meaning that you, the reader, may get to make decisions that affect the story and characters! Please do be aware though that the chapter navigation will be a bit iffy because of this, and try to pay attention to where you're jumping to when I try my best to direct you to the right pages.

…

9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1… 0.

“Your fate is sealed.”

***BANG***

A gunshot pierces through the silence, jolting me awake as its echo rolls through my ears. Eyes cracked wide open, I try to remain calm, but… This room… I don’t know it. I have never been here before… What the hell?

The room I’m in is large and tall, but mostly empty. The walls appear to be made of concrete, the oppression and coldness exuding itself from it apparent. I’m lying in some bed. It isn’t the most comfortable in the world, but better than the floor, I guess. The bed reserves itself in a corner. To my right is a sink and some kind of partition beyond it.

On the wall opposite of me is a door. I get up from the bed and wobble towards it. The door looks to be made out of metal, and right next to it is a number keypad. Looks like I can enter any number from 0 to 9. I try some random numbers, but it didn’t work… And it looks like I can only input up to 3 digits. Ignoring it for now, I try to open the door. It doesn’t move. Figures. This keypad has to be the way to unlock this. But I have no idea what the code is, so isn’t that just great? I kick the door and look up towards the ceiling.

Dangling from it is a hook, above the bed. Can I reach that? I stood up on the bed for a little more height, but no dice. It’s really annoying, it feels like I can reach it but it’s just out of range. Perfect, that’s exactly what I need now. I jump up high with extreme frustration, both hands raised in another futile attempt, but… Then I noticed something. Something weird and very, very wrong.

There’s a red… Thing on my left wrist. Is it a watch? No, it doesn’t look like any watch I’ve ever seen. I sat down on the bed and examined it. There’s an LCD display on this thing, and it displays a single number. The number 4 is there in bright cyan.

“4, huh…” What did it mean? I had no clue. Why was I wearing this anyway? I flipped my wrist over to find a latch to remove it, but… There was nothing there. I looked at this thing from all angles, but there’s nothing I can see that might remove itself. Actually, there’s these weird buttons or protrusions or whatever on either side of the display. Pressing them, I can’t see any change happening. The 4 is still there.

Damn it all, what the hell is this? Why am I here? Who brought me here? When? What happened to me before I woke up here? More and more questions piled up in my head. Trying to remember something, anything… But nothing. I drew a complete blank. I don’t know what day, or month, or even year it is. I don’t know... Who am I? My name... I don't remember it. That's... No. I have to be able to remember something, even the littlest of things...

Wait... I do remember something. It was vague, but an image of **fire** ran through my mind. A fire? Did something bad happen to me? I guess that might explain why I ended up here... No, that's impossible. This doesn't look like any kind of hospital I've ever seen. If I was involved in a fire related incident, I had no idea what it was, and the context of it. I kicked the door a bunch of times in frustration. Fuck this. What about the partition next to the sink? Looks like there’s a toilet there, at least whoever put me here has some sense of privacy. I don’t need to take a crap right now, so I’ll pass on that.

“Ugh… Great.” Mumbling to myself, I sit back down on the bed, trying to process all of this. It’s too much… I don’t know who I am and I’m stuck here in this weird place with this weird thing on my wrist. Too much weird for me. Way too many questions. But… If I’m gonna get any answers, I need to do something.

“I have no idea where I am, but if I stay here, it won’t solve anything… I gotta get out of here.” That’s it. I’ve declared it. I need to find a way out of this place. But how? Well… I’ll need to take another look around here.

**Seek a way out!**

“Hmm… Where to start.” I stood up and went over to the toilet again. It looks well maintained and real clean. There isn’t any shit or piss inside, thankfully. I push down on the handle and it flushes. Well, that was about as useful as nothing. As the bowl was refilling itself, I decide to open the toilet tank lid and see if there’s anything there. One of the oldest tricks in the book.

“Well, well… Look what we have here.” Looks like something got scribbled in permanent marker on the bottom of the tank. “789, huh…” The number’s there, but I have no idea what it means. Well, I better remember that number, it’s probably a clue on how to leave this hellhole. Putting the lid back on, I move over to the sink. There’s a mirror above the sink, I look like some run of the mill college student who feeds himself only on instant ramen. That’ll be fun to go back to if I get out of here…

The sink. I turn the taps, but no water comes out. That’s weird… The taps don’t feel normal, in fact. They feel very loose. What the hell? I turn the taps some more, and they come off. Well, shit. I got 2 taps, but that ain’t gonna do me any good now. Is this faucet gonna come off too? I grabbed and yanked on the faucet with relatively little effort, but it submits easily and detaches from the sink.

“Holy shit, what?” I stared at the faucet in my hand. Am I some kind of superman? Do I have magnificent strength? Why were those things so loose? The toilet looked fine but I guess the person who manages this place doesn’t give a shit about the sink. I have these things now, but I don’t think I can do anything with them.

“... Wait a second.” This faucet’s kind of hook shaped. I could use it to reach and grab that hook! I stand up on the bed, use the faucet to reach the hook, and pull it down. The plate of ceiling the hook is attached to gets lowered, and it reveals a compartment. I gotta pull this down some more… There we go. Looks like there’s a briefcase inside this thing. Grabbing the thing, I immediately try to open it. It’s locked, great.

It has one of those 3 digit rotary locks. Well, I did see a number here earlier, so let’s try that. 789… Nope. Not the right one. Is it the code for the door? Nope, not that either. Maybe 789 is only part of the code… In which case, there’s something I still need to find around here. Where could it be?

Well, the only real thing left I’ve yet to properly examine is the bed… Let’s see here. Anything under it? Nope. Anything in the sheets? Nope. What about the pillow? I search the pillowcase and grab onto something square shaped.

“Gotcha.” I pull it outta there. It’s some kind of index card. Written on it is “-456”. -456? Hmm… I guess it’s saying I gotta subtract 456 from something. Let’s try 789… That’d be… 333. Nice number. Briefcase, is that your card?... It is. It’s open now, great. What’s inside?

“Just a piece of paper… Perfect.” There’s some words on this thing. Let’s give it a read…

To calculate a digital root, add all of the numbers in question to one another. Example: The digital root of 123 is 6. 1 + 2 + 3 = 6. If you end up with a double digit number, add the digits to one another once again. Example: The digital root of 678 is 3. 6 + 7 + 8 = 21. 2 + 1 = 3.

“So I guess I add numbers together until I get just one, huh… But why did I need to know that?” Maybe I’ll know when I need to use it. Aside from that, there’s an extraneous number on the bottom. 132. Is that the code for the exit? I punch in the numbers to the keypad… And it makes a beeping noise. That’s promising. I push on the door lightly… And it moves!

“Yes, please let me out of here!” I pushed it open excitedly.

**You found it!**

I step out into a hallway with a bunch of doors that look exactly like the one that I just came out of. How many are there? There’s 4 including the one I just came out of, 4 more on the other side, and 1 more to my far left. That makes for a total of 9 doors… The door I had just opened shut itself as I was busying myself with the other doors. Looks like they won’t open. Calling out for someone, I don’t get any response either. And looking back at the door I came out of, looks like it's locked again. Great. Well, not that I need to go back to that room anyway…

There was one more door to the far right of the hallway, but it was a different looking door from the others. It was an elevator. There was only a button with the up symbol on it… Guess I should press it and call the elevator. The button itself lights up as I push it with my finger. A second later, the door opens. Awesome. Inside there’s only 2 buttons. Weird… An up and a down button. Pressing the down button didn’t do anything, so I guess I gotta go up. Without further delay, pressing the up button made the elevator close its doors and move up.

…

It wasn’t long before the doors opened again. I stepped out to find myself in a large room that has the vibe of an auditorium. It’s clearly not an auditorium, but it had the characteristics of one... a short distance in front of the elevator door, there were a great many rows of metal folding chairs. How many of these are there? Wait... There’s people here. On a stage in front of the chairs... It looks like they’re 5 of them, and they’re all talking behind a podium on stage... A man, 2 younger men, an elderly woman, and a... Child? Looks like a boy. I gotta go talk to them.

“Hey, do you guys know what’s going on?” I jogged up to the podium, taking only a matter of seconds. I scanned them closer now that I was in talking reach within them. The older of the 3 men was wearing a brown leather suit. He’s giving off a dignified and composed vibe, but his face was serious, like a man who’d like to get down to [business] right away. By chance, he spoke up as I looked at him.

“No, I’ve no idea. Another one of us, huh? How many people are there in this place?” Business sighed, stroking his chin thoughtfully.

“Who knows...” Next to speak up was one of the younger men. He was wearing dark, moody clothes like a teenager who hadn’t gotten out of an edgy phase. His hair was completely combed backwards, shining like it had been soaked with grease. His jeans were worn and torn like he’d been wearing them for years. If there’s anything this guy is, it’s a [punk]. “Could be a lot more, we don’t even know how we got here.” He gave a dirty look to no one in particular as he irritatingly scratched the back of his neck.

“There ain’t any way for us to know, is there?” The other young man spoke. He seemed to be about the same age as the Punk, and was wearing a similar clothing convention, but his vibe was completely different. He didn’t feel like he was a child who hadn’t grown up yet. He had been wearing a blue jacket with what looked like a grafitti design on it, along with a cap on his head. Maybe he’d seen some shit. He looks like some [rapper] from a barely sold album... But he seemed to be alright in comparison to the Punk.

“What in Sam Hill happened to me...?” The elderly woman muttered to herself. She was wearing overalls with a red and white checkered shirt, and a straw hat. Everything points to her being an old time [farmer]. Then again, I probably shouldn’t judge a book by its cover... But this is a bit much to just be an act.

The [child] was twiddling his thumbs, making quiet sobbing noises. He had not said a word and didn’t look like he wanted to change that. He stared at the ground as his tears slowly dropped to the floor. What is a kid doing here? He must be scared shitless...

I looked at my new companions again: Business, Punk, Rapper, Farmer, and the Child. There was one thing all 6 of us had in common... We were all wearing that red watch thing. What was that thing? What was it supposed to do? I remembered the number 4 had been on mine... I still had no idea what that might mean.

It suddenly got quiet between us. No one knew what to say or do. The Child’s occasional cries echoed throughout the room. I moved to examine the podium we’d all been standing behind. On it, there was a screen with a large circle in the middle, with the text “SCAN HERE” above it in bright red. The text felt... Unsettling, and detached. Below the circle there was a rectangle that ran the width of the screen.

“Um... What is this?” I turned to my companions. This time, the Rapper spoke up.

“We don’t know. But it sure looks suspicious. I don’t want to touch it or scan or whatever it wants unless I have to.”

“Hmm...” I shrugged it off and moved to behind the stage. There had been a double door there that I saw out of the corner of my eye... Let’s give this a try. I grabbed the handles and shook them, but to no avail.

“We had a look at that door earlier before you came. Of course, it was locked... Now all we can do is wait for the others to come back.” Business followed me to the door and spoke as I moved to open the door.

“Wait, the others? There are more people here?” I gave Business an inquiring look.

“Yeah. You see that?” Business pointed to the other side of the room. It was only then that I noticed that there had been 2 flights of stairs on either side of the auditorium, both running across the wall to the opposite point where I had been standing and where Business was pointing, to another double door. “The 3 of them went in there, so we were waiting for them to come back.” At the bottom of each of the stairs there were more double doors. That meant at each of the 4 cardinal directions of the auditorium, there would be a double door there.

“3 of them? Huh...” I scratched my head. If Business was telling the truth, then that meant there were 9 of us locked up in this place. 9 people... That did match with the number of doors in that hallway I saw when I escaped from that cell like room. But what did 9 people have to do with anything? Why had any of them been grabbed and placed here? Why 9 people specifically?

These questions would not go unanswered for long. A noise suddenly echoed through the auditorium. It had been a door opening. My eyes immediately turned to the source: The top of the stairs.


End file.
